Genesis 43:1–10

¹Now the famine was still severe in the land. ²So when Jacob’s sons had eaten all the grain they had brought from Egypt, their father said to them, “Go back and buy us a little more food.”

³But Judah replied, “The man solemnly warned us, ‘You will not see my face again unless your brother is with you.’ ⁴If you will send our brother with us, we will go down and buy food for you. ⁵But if you will not send him, we will not go; for the man told us, ‘You will not see my face again unless your brother is with you.’”

⁶“Why did you bring this trouble upon me?” Israel asked. “Why did you tell the man you had another brother?”

⁷They replied, “The man questioned us in detail about ourselves and our family: ‘Is your father still alive? Do you have another brother?’ And we answered him accordingly. How could we possibly know that he would say, ‘Bring your brother here’?”

⁸And Judah said to his father Israel, “Send the boy with me, and we will go at once, so that we may live and not die— neither we, nor you, nor our children. ⁹I will guarantee his safety. You may hold me personally responsible. If I do not bring him back and set him before you, then may I bear the guilt before you all my life. ¹⁰If we had not delayed, we could have come and gone twice by now.”